The Follies of Men
by TheTinyMouse
Summary: Having a hangover still did not explain how she managed to get herself into this situation. Waking up in a cart, bound for her own execution, Sofie will learn that living in Skyrim is just as harsh as its climate. Goodbye London, you shall be missed! - OC falls into Tamriel story. Mostly gen.


It wasn't the strange, unusual noises surrounding her that woke her up, but the swaying and rocking motion of her seat that was not helping her nausea in any way. Groaning, her head lolled right and left with the movement of whatever she was sitting on exactly, because where the hell was she anyway? It took near superhuman effort to simply raise her head enough to look at her surroundings, eyes crummy and squinting in the harsh sunlight. Alright, so not only was she outside (again, what the hell?), but she swore that she could see a _mountain range_ scrawling over the treetops which was even stranger because last she knew, she'd been partying it up in the middle of London and England itself wasn't very prolific in the type of rock formation that she was currently eyeing sideways and squinting at.

Whatever was moving underneath her suddenly hit a rock and she cursed as she jumped in her seat due to the motion, her nausea coming back full force, and she raised a hand to stave off the near inevitable spewage of whatever she'd been drinking the night before – which had been a lot, she recalled at least three different pubs, one club, and many, many assortments of fruity and very alcoholic drinks passing through her hands over the evening and most of the early morning. It was only when trying to raise said hand to her mouth and thus avoid throwing up all over herself that she noticed something even stranger than her current location – her hands were bound. What the fuck.

"What the fuck."

She stared bewildered at the rope encircling her wrists tightly and finally noticing that they were actually cutting of the circulation in her hands which had been slowly turning towards a nice shade of cerise. With the mother of all hangovers, which meant an orchestra composed solely of pots and pans clanging together in her head and a roiling stomach to end all roiling stomachs, she tried to explain away why it had taken her so long to notice her exact situation, which seemed to be something like this: someone with a fetish for rope bondage had kidnapped her after a night of heavy drinking.

And then a man (the kidnapper possibly?) snapped her out of her thoughts, "Hey you, you're finally awake."

There, across from her and slightly to her left, sat a blond, gruff looking guy in weird blue armour. Ok, so not only was her (possible) kidnapper a bondage fetishist but also some sort of RPG nerd maybe, she didn't have a clue about any of that stuff as it had been her little sister who'd obsessed over that sort of computer shizz, things that had gone straight over her own head. And so, she simply stared dully at the man, who seemed to take it as some sort of ok from her to continue chatting away. Not really listening, as her stomach was once again rebelling against her, she tried looking around to focus her thoughts on other things.

Alright, so she was in an old wooden carriage being drawn by a stocky horse and a man dressed in different armour from the guy across her, with two other men sitting inside the carriage itself. As each motion of her head didn't really help her predicament with the trying-not-to-puke thing, she slowly roved her eyes about her, cataloguing what she saw. Apart from soldier boys one and two, there was a scrawny and shifty looking brunet in tattered brown clothing (was he making some sort of fashion statement coordination hair colour and cloth colour?) sitting across from her as well, and on her right, a tall buff blond in rich clothing whose imposing demeanour was in no way impeded by the cloth gag wrapped around his head. Which, what? Apparently it wasn't only bondage Mr. Kidnapper was interested in (she'd noticed that all of her seat-mates also had bound hands), but gagging as well? Boy was she glad she didn't have one of her own, because gross. That thing looked as old as her grandpa, bless his dear departed soul.

Shifting her focus back on blond guy number one, AKA soldier boy numero uno, she caught the tail-end of what he was saying.

"Watch your tongue! You're speaking to Ulfric stormcloak, the true High King."

So apparently the gagged one was important, which probably explained his clothes. Huh, the more you know – though, thinking about it, she didn't think she'd ever heard of this Ulfric Stormcloak. In any case, it seemed that the news of whom exactly they were sharing carriage space with made Scrawny-and-Shifty even more nervous than before.

"Ulfric? The Jarl of Windhelm? You're the leader of the rebellion... if they've captured you... oh gods, where are they taking us?"

What the hell was a Jarl anyway? Gods, she was seriously regretting everything she'd done last night, cursing to the highest heavens and the lowest pits of hell the friends whose grand idea it'd been to celebrate her promotion by going binge drinking on a pub-crawl across London, on a week-day. She just knew that this was Life's way of telling her off for doing so, the Universe's version of her cruel boss waggling her always pink painted nails in that oh-you- _didn't_ fashion that always managed to both get thoroughly on her nerves and make her feel like a sheepish five year old with crumbs all over her face from stolen biscuits.

A bit farther off from where they were sat, astride another one of those stocky horses that seemed to be common wherever she'd landed herself, was a soldier dressed in the same armour as the man leading the carriage, only really noticing him by what he announced next,which jolted her completely conscious better than any alarm she'd ever had the misfortune of owning.

"General Tulius, sir! The headsman is waiting."

She stared at him in horror and fairly shrieked at the man who'd first spoken to her, "Did he just say headsman? As in, executioner?!"

"Aye lass, we're all here for some crime or other, be it for being a Stormcloak," he motioned towards himself with a bound hand, "or a horse-thief," here he nodded towards the brunet, "or simply for trying to cross the border." And here he nodded at her, as if to tell her she was the one who'd tried to do so.

"Border? What border! What country am I in?" She could feel hysteria quickly taking hold of her mind.

Here, all men looked at her somewhat in askance in varying degrees of befuddlement. "Well, Skyrim of course."

"Oh yes, of course, Skyrim, right." She paused. "Where the fuck is that."

Now they were outright staring, and she shrunk into herself as well she could with hands bound and, wait just one minute.

"What the hell am I wearing! What happened to my clothes? Where are my jeans? And my shoes!" She was nearly screaming by the end of that tirade but Gods dammit those heels had cost her £120!

"Hey! Shut up back there," shouted the driver, turning around the scowl meanly at her and she whimpered, hands coming up to awkwardly hold her head up, elbows resting on her knees.

"This can't be happening…" Not only had she been kidnapped but also transported to some strange country all so that they could execute her for some slight that she'd maybe done when she was piss drunk. And on top of that, they'd taken her clothes, shoes, and most likely her purse as well if she hadn't managed to lose it beforehand, not that she had any idea. Yes, she was bemoaning the fact that her belongings were gone more than her imminent execution, but people had always accused her of having skewed priorities.

So taken by her thoughts of impending doom clad in the shabbiest excuse for clothing she'd ever had the horror of wearing (this trumped the actual potato sack her mother had put her in as a child for one Halloween when they'd been absolute cheapskates and mummy dearest had refused to spend money on something she'd grow out of within the year), she only noticed they'd arrived to their end destination by the jarring stop of the cart.

The apparent horse-thief easily summed up her thoughts, "Why are we stopping?"

The blond soldier stared at him solemnly, "What do you think? End of the line." He stood up, intending to descend and enter into what she now fondly called her end of days. "Let's go, we shouldn't keep the gods waiting for us."

The thief whimpered, following after him, "No, wait! We're not rebels!"

This seemed to be the wrong thing to say as the blond gave him a ferocious stare-down she could feel from where she was standing at the very back of the little group of four they made up.

"Face your death with courage, thief."

And it all hit her at once, she was going to _die_. Echoing the whimper of the snivelling man in front of her, she curved into herself and felt her eyes itch as they welled up with fat, salty tears. Oh gods, was this really it? Was her life so insignificant that her fate was to die in some strange country far from her home? Beheaded as well! How barbaric, did they think this was Revolutionary France? But she saw no guillotine, only more soldiers, what appeared to be a female priest going by her brown habit and the amulet resting over her chest (at least they were kind enough to give them their last rites, though she knew not what god or gods they prayed to), and finally, garbed in ominous black with an obscuring cowl and a massive two-handed axe already bloody with past kills resting on his shoulder mockingly, was the man that would take her life today.

Two soldiers, wearing the same leather brown armour as those who seemed to be in charge – there were more of the same sort of blueish armour as the blond man, though they were all prisoners as well – stood in front of them with the one on the right, a large man with brown hair slightly past his ears and strangely kind eyes, holding what appeared to be a clipboard. How quaint and organised, she jeered in her head.

The one on the left, whom she now realised was a woman, gazed at them coldly, "Step towards the block when we call your name, one at a time."

As the blond soldier grumbled under his breath about Empires and lists (which, what?), the man with the clipboard started reading out the names one by one, starting with the so called Jarl of Windhelm. As he regally moved towards the group of prisoners awaiting sentence, it was then the blond soldier's turn ("Ralof of Riverwood"), and then the horse-thief's ("Lokir of Rorikstead"). She'd never heard of any of those cities, never mind that she didn't recognise the country itself, but she filed away the names for later so at least she'd know in whose company she'd be dying. Then it was her turn as the last in line, and she reluctantly stepped forward. But before anything else could happen, the horse-thief, Lokir, started running down the road they'd taken to get into the little village in a desperate last attempt at getting away.

"No, I'm not a rebel! You can't do this!"

The female soldier immediately stepped forward, motioning towards a man carrying what looked to be an actual wooden bow. "Halt!" she cried, but seeing as Lokir just kept running, simply barked out an "Archers!"

The archer took his stance before shooting an arrow straight into the fleeing man's back. Flying forward and landing on his stomach, she kept waiting for him to stand up but nothing, not even a twitch. Feeling her nausea come back with a vengeance, she hunched forward and slapped her hands over her mouth. As if she hadn't just ordered a man killed (though considering the circumstances, these people seemed well acquainted with death), the female soldier glared over where the other prisoners were gathered.

"Anyone else feel like running?" She dared, eyes gleaming malevolently at the idea of chasing down more unfortunate souls. Seeing no one else make a move, she nodded at her male compatriot.

"Ah…" He seemed confused as he looked at his clipboard. "… Who are you?"

She stared back, just as confused. They had kidnapped her and were also plotting to murder her in some medieval ritualistic execution considering everybody's garments, and all of this without even knowing her name? Hadn't they looked at her ID after taking her purse?

"Sofie Blackdale… Of London?"

It was silent for a few seconds, before he turned towards the woman whom she now thought to be his superior since he seemed to defer to her.

"Captain what should we do? She's not on the list."

With an irritated motion of the hand that said a great deal of what she thought of _the list_ , the woman confirmed Sofie's execution sentence. "Forget the list, she goes straight to the block."

"By your orders, Captain." He looked back at her, "I'm sorry; we'll make sure your remains are given a proper burial. Follow the Captain, prisoner."

As if in a daze, Sofie walked to where she was told to stand, a crowd of men and women surrounding her awaiting the same fate that had befallen her. Not paying much attention to what the man in charge was saying to the Jarl guy, she watched blankly as the female priest made to stand before them. Vaguely, she heard a far off roar tear through the skies, startling a few people. The man, General Tullius, finished speaking and the female captain motioned the priest to start. Noise was filtering in and out of focus, and she only barely saw one of the prisoners cut off the priest in a rude motion before kneeling at the block.

The sharp thwack of the axe hitting the wood after tearing through bone and muscle startled her awake from her stupor, and she stared horrified at the blood gushing from the dead body, the head having fallen in the basket placed by the block to catch its offering. The cooling corpse was shoved aside unceremoniously as the prisoners started shouting insults at the "Imperials", whilst some of the townsfolk that had stayed for the show shouted right back in jeering slurs.

"Next, the short one!"

Jerking her head up, she noticed that she was indeed one of the shortest ones there, nearly all of the men and even the women towering over heard by a good head or so (and wasn't that a thought, had they gone before her they'd all have been close to the same height). Whimpering, she could feel her tears come back up and her stomach clench and roil, reminding her of the hangover she was still suffering from. Seeing the impatient look on the Captain's face, she gingerly made her way forward, awkwardly shuffling around the dead body in the way.

With a rough hand on her shoulder from the headsman, she was forcibly made to kneel on the cold ground, then bent forward to rest her head on the block. She gurgled slightly to herself, vomit crawling up her throat as she felt the congealing blood of the previous victim stick to the side of her face and some of her hair. Her bound hands clenched at the tattered brown trousers covering her legs, eyes closing as she hoped for a quick death.

So focused, she didn't hear the next roar that tore the skies, nor did she see the headsman raise his axe high above him so he could have maximum power over the swing that would bring about her death, nor did she see the dark shape cross the sky behind the watchtower they were in front of. While she may not have noticed any of these things, there was no helping the bone-shaking tremor brought about an honest to god _dragon_.

Having snapped open her eyes, she stared in amazement at the large reptilian creature atop the tower and barely saw the headsman fall over, axe clattering uselessly to the ground. People were screaming, but she could only see the magnificent creature that raised its head to _shout_ at the skies, bringing down what she could only describe as hellfire. A small meteorite smashed into the ground close to where she was, and she felt her body fly off the execution block to crash back down in a daze.

A hand suddenly grasped at her upper arm and hauled her up to her feet. It was Ralof of Riverwood, and he shook her some before pulling her across the road towards another tower, this one bigger than the one the dragon had previously landed upon.

"Come on!" He shouted, "The guards won't give us another chance, this way." Dragging her behind him, she could barely get her feet under her. They quickly made it to the doorway where some other soldiers dressed in the same armour were waiting, closing and locking the door as soon as they'd passed through it. Ralof quickly found a dagger that he used to cut the ropes around his own wrists skilfully, and she was about the motion to her own when his attention was taken by the man dressed in royal garbs.

"Jarl Ulfric, what is that thing? Could the legends be true?"

The man, having spat out the gag in his mouth, nodded at him, rubbing at his newly unbound wrists. "Legends don't burn down villages." As if to concur and remind everyone within the vicinity of what exactly was happening outside, the beast roared loudly, shaking the very ground they stood upon.

As if by telepathic communication, all the soldiers started moving in a flurry of nerves. Ralof turned back towards Sofie, once again completely ignoring her still bound hands. Before she could get a word in edge-wise (not that she was sure she could have, the way her tongue seemed to be leaden with dead weight), he pointed at the stairs.

"We need to move, now!"

Not really bothering with the logistics of the possible exits available at the top of towers, she nonetheless followed him, running up the circular stone staircase. A shout stopped her short, and she gaped in undignified horror as a man, who'd been just a bit farther up the stairs from her, was blasted away in debris and flame as the dragon crashed into the tower, breaching the wall and unleashing an inferno upon those unfortunate enough to be in the way.

Frozen, she could only stare as it flew away, most likely to look for better pray that people stuck in a stone tower. She barely registered Ralof once again taking her by the shoulder and leading her to the hole blasted into the stone. Motioning outside, she followed where he was pointing to look at the roof of what appeared to be an inn, which had collapsed inwards, showing the inner rooms.

"See the inn on the other side?" He shouted, "Jump through the roof and keep going! We'll follow when we can!"

Her tongue finally started working again and Sofie shrieked, "Jump through the roof? Are you insane?!"

Obviously, Ralof had little care for what she thought and simply placed two hands on her waist, lifting her up. Smiling roguishly at her terrified face, he said, "Be careful with the landing!" And then he threw her through the hole and towards the broken roof of the inn.

Ah, Sofie thought, so this is how I die.

Luckily, Sofie did not die from her fall through the roof. Instead, she landed on an auspiciously placed bed, bouncing once on the hard straw mattress. No matter, nothing was broken and better yet, she was alive. Taking a second to gather her scattered thoughts (not that they'd been very organised previously, what with the day she'd been having), she looked back up at the hole in the tower she'd just come from. Ralof was gone, probably having run down instead of up, and made his own exit much easier than hers.

Another terrifying roar shook her, and she clambered to her feet, running towards the other side of the room. The stairs, she noticed, had collapsed, but so had much of the floor itself and some of the wall, and she could see the outside from where she stood. Carefully, she got to her knees, taking care to have a good grasp on the broken planks before lowering herself through the gap and dangling for a few seconds. Thankfully, the ground floor was close enough and she landed easily enough on her own two feet.

Ducking under broken beams and crumbled stone, she made her way out where she saw a villager and a child, as well as the soldier who'd held that stupid clipboard earlier. The soldier was shouting at the child to come closer, the boy staring at another villager, most likely his father, who'd fallen down a bit farther off. As she came closer, the ground shook once again, signifying the dragon's landing. In both awe and horror, she witnessed its gaping maws shoot a terrible stream of fire at the fallen man, burning him to a crisp. It might have been her imagination, but she could have sworn that she could hear it speak, words intermingling with the roar of its breath.

The boy cried out as he watched his father die before his eyes, the other villager shielding him too late, before dragging the child away to hide behind the house close to them and opposite the one she'd just come out of. The soldier looked up at her, sword drawn in preparation of anything (not, she reckoned, that it'd do much against a dragon).

"Still alive, prisoner?"

Yes, yes, she was still alive, thank you very much.

"Keep close to me if you want to stay that way."

Well, if that wasn't the most brilliant thing she'd heard all day. "Ok!"

The soldier, whose name she didn't know, turned towards the villager, instructing him to take care of the boy as he had to find his General and join the defence. Now that last part she wasn't so keen on. Then he motioned at her to follow him and she did, running as close to his back as she could without stumbling on his feet, eager to stay as close as possible to her likeliest ticket out of there.

They ran and ran, crouching behind a wall as the dragon landed on it, wings ruffling her hair, and she could feel the strange heat they emanated before it roared once more and took off. Gasping for breath, as she'd unconsciously held it whilst crouching, she once more followed the soldier though this time through the broken remains of a house. Coming out through what had once been the main door, she looked delightedly upon the massive gates that obviously led _out_ of the village.

More imperial soldiers stood there shooting arrows at the moving beast in the skies, and was that woman shooting _fire from her hands?_ Sure that she was hallucinating, which would not have surprised her considering her day, she made to go towards the big doors that were metaphorically glowing green with the big words EXIT upon them. She'd only taken a few steps when her arm was, again, taken in a rough hand and she was dragged from her freedom.

"Hey! The door was right there! What are you doing, let go of me!"

The soldier was ignoring her pitiful attempts at escaping, single-mindedly running towards another building, and this one in significant better shape than the rest of the village. "Follow me, we have to get to the keep."

Whining that she didn't _want_ to go to the keep, she was again distracted by the enormous shadow of the flying creature passing overhead. Hearing the agonised screams of dying and wounded soldiers behind them, she decided that maybe the keep was a good idea and she started running instead of being actively dragged.

As they made it to some kind of courtyard, the soldier slowed down upon seeing the man that had thrown her out of the tower (not that he knew that). "Ralof! You damned traitor, out of my way!"

Well wasn't he a bundle of sunshine.

"We're escaping, Hadvar." Oh, so _that_ was his name! "You're not stopping us this time!"

She could smell the testosterone surrounding their macho match-off.

Hadvar near spat what he said, "Fine, I hope the dragon takes you all to Sovngarde."

What the hell is a Sovngarde? Grumbling, Sofie looked between the two men who seemed to have forgotten that there was a _dragon wreaking havoc around them_. She would have crossed her arms and put on her bitchiest face, but since her hands were still bound she had to settle for the face and cocking her hip to the side while tapping a finger on her leg.

"Well, gentlemen, if one of you could point me to the safest place stat, I'd be very grateful."

Her words had the desired effect of shaking them out of their stare down (seemed like there was some history there), and Ralof looked at her, shouting, "You! Come on, into the keep!"

Hadvar also looked at her, "With me, prisoner. Let's go!"

Ok, so she had to choose? Urgh, why did this feel like a three-way gone wrong? Knowing she had little time, she stared at them both in turn. One the one side, you had Ralof with whom she'd shared the bonds of prisoner-ship, and on the other you had Hadvar, who'd looked at her with kind and sad eyes. On the flip side, Ralof had merrily thrown her from a tower whilst Hadvar hadn't done particularly much to stop her execution.

Taking a big breath, she started to sing under her breath, "Eenie, meenie, minie, moe…" Another rumble across the ground quickly stopped that and she squeaked, jumping towards the closest man who then secured a hand around her arm, _again,_ taking her towards a door leading to what she she could only assume was the keep.

"We've got to get inside, go!"

And the door slammed shut behind them.

* * *

OK! So, this is something I've wanted to do for _ages_. I never expected it to get so long though! 4400+! Christ on a cracker, that's like essay length. And all in one evening too, I'm quite proud of myself as I usually lose track of what I'm writing… But this was fun!

So meet Sofie Blackdale of London! I literally just made her up as I was going along. As far as you all know, and as far as I know myself, she's a short gal from London who just got promoted at work (err, no clue what job though), has a female boss who likes pink nail polish, and very skewed priorities. Also, she has a thing for fashion, which you might have noticed. Please make her feel welcome!

Anyway, I'd love to hear what you think of the story! I know Sofie, being from our world, would probably have reacted more strongly than she did in this chapter, but blame it on her killer hangover and the shock, normally she's quite the chatterbox when scared or nervous. Also, guess who she followed in the end! I've already decided who it is, but I'd like to hear your thoughts on whether you think Stormcloak or Imperial. Not to say that who she's with will decide her political leanings later on… That will be a surprise!

I have quite a few ideas for this story, and hopefully you guys will enjoy them! So here's another story of person-from-our-world-falls-into-video-game-world and all the shenanigans and problems that come with.

Also, 120 GBP is about 185 USD.

See you next time!

Disclaimer: I don't own the Elder Scrolls.


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